<html>

<head>
<title>file:///C:/FrontPage Webs/Content/flamingoweb/FirstListmomnote.txt</title>
</head>

<body>

<p>Listmom note: the following letter is written by Robin who <br>
was the founder and first listmom to VenicePlace. Robin is still <br>
active in fandom and sometimes is on the VP list, and sometimes <br>
not, but as the first listmom, her letter here is interesting as <br>
a historical note *and* introduction. Robin was unable to keep <br>
up as listmom and handed it over to Flamingo in Spring of 1998, <br>
but she is still listmom of the gen S&amp;H list ZebraThree. </p>

<p>Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 11:13:30 -0500<br>
From: Robin<br>
Subject: [VP] &quot;net&quot; seems appropriate<br>
<br>
</p>

<p>Well, it looks like we've had to add quite a few new floors <br>
lately to the apartment building to accommodate everyone coming <br>
in. Fortunately, like the TARDIS, vp is bigger on the inside than <br>
from without, and hey, there's plenty of room. </p>

<p>So, as I sit here in my apartment somewhere on the middle floors <br>
of vp (the ground floor being occupied by that lovely Italian <br>
restaurant I can't remember the name of at the moment), my walls <br>
covered with Russell Crowe/&quot;Man in the Iron Mask&quot;/Les Miz posters <br>
plus one real-life vintage S&amp;H poster I dare hang only in my <br>
cyber-apartment (since I know no harm will befall it here), I <br>
find myself thinking how quickly things move on-line. </p>

<p>Back when I first got on the net (not counting small local nets) <br>
in '91, the only place to find fanfic on-line seemed to be <br>
alt.startrek.creative and its ftp archives. (As in hardcopy <br>
fanfic, Trek seems to have been one of the first to break <br>
through.) All gen, no adult, definitely no slash. Only once or <br>
twice in several years did I ever even see K/S mentioned in a <br>
newsgroup, and only then in passing. As for other fandoms--<br>
almost nothing. It was a battle just to start up alt.tv.quantum-<br>
leap.creative a couple of years later in '93(?) (the first <br>
.creative newsgroup besides the Trek one, IIRC, and boy was that <br>
a learning experience). Dr. Who and comics .creative groups <br>
showed up shortly after. </p>

<p>In '94, there were more .creative groups, and I got on the web; <br>
in '95 I think I started seeing fanfic on the web, but no slash, <br>
though some slash mailing lists were in evidence. In '96, vp got <br>
underway underground, and by the middle of the year I started <br>
seeing a slash site or two appear in the search engines. </p>

<p>Then, boom--like floodgates giving way, within a year slash was <br>
abruptly very, very public on the web, and it's just kept gaining <br>
momentum since. </p>

<p>I'm not getting into the issue here of whether I think it's a <br>
good or a bad thing that fanfic/slash has become as public as it <br>
has in some fandoms. But as an observer it still surprises me <br>
how *quickly* it has all happened, and how quickly it has become <br>
the &quot;norm&quot; for many fans on-line, and how many fans have been <br>
introduced to slash fandom this way. If just over two years ago <br>
there was hardly any sign that slash would find its way onto the <br>
web, what else might happen two years from now? </p>

<p>(Gee, and while I'm reminiscing and the subject of net shorthand <br>
has come up recently, I remember the days when smileys and <br>
&quot;IMHO&quot;s and &quot;ROFL&quot;s were what we had, and &quot;LOL&quot;s and
&quot;&lt;g&gt;&quot;s only <br>
appeared when AOL joined the rest of Usenet in '95(?). I could <br>
start going on about how different subgroups develop their own <br>
shorthand, but now I'm just getting silly :-)<br>
<br>
</p>

<p>Robin </p>
</body>
</html>
